Archive for the ‘Austin Sprite’ tag

Each November, the Cape Cod British Car Club holds the Freezin’ Fun for Kids Run, an end-of-year drive to benefit a local charity. Last year, Mark McCourt and I tagged along behind the pack in one of our Hemmings minivans, a Honda Odyssey that was … not terribly British. Club member Rick Johnson invited me to return this year, luring me with the offer of a ride in something much more appropriate: An Austin-Healey “Bugeye” Sprite. How could I say no?

Not for nothing is Rick known as the “Bugeye Bum” – he has four running Bugeyes for the street, plus two race cars. His plan was for me to take the Silver Bullet, a 1959 Mk I Bugeye with a 1,275cc four and a disc brake conversion, but when a mechanical issue cropped up (a broken axle, which Rick tells me isn’t uncommon), he handed me the key to the Red Rocket instead. This is a 1961 Mk II Sprite – no, not a Bugeye, though it has a Bugeye nose. It has the standard 1,098cc engine and a disc brake conversion. “It gets the least attention and gets only the leftovers from the other, more cared-for rides,” Rick says. “But when needed, it gets us there.”

As promised, the course was scenic and twisty, just ideal for a car like the Sprite. The Red Rocket was a blast to drive, and the weather was amazingly mild, with temperatures in the high 60s. (If “Freezin’ Fun” is false advertising, it’s the kind of false advertising I can get behind.) This was the eighth annual run, an event inspired by the “Santa runs” organized by motorcycle clubs, and the beneficiary was Independence House, a program for at-risk women and their families on Cape Cod. The voluntary entry fee was a gift card to help brighten a family’s holidays.

There were nearly three dozen of us on the tour. We passed some points of interest around Boston’s South Shore, one of which was the National Monument to the Forefathers, a massive, 81-foot-tall granite monument dedicated to the Mayflower Pilgrims, shown in the photo at top. Everyone’s heard of Plymouth Rock, but I’d never heard of this landmark, which is just a stone’s throw (har) away. It’s believed to be the world’s largest solid granite monument.

At the end of the run, we rendezvoused at The Bailey Pub and Restaurant in Marshfield, where we sat down for brunch, or lunch, or both. That’s where the club held its silent auction, which raised $1,500 for Independence House. That’s the Red Rocket across the street. (Behind the blue Spitfire, you can see my daily driver, a Monte Carlo Yellow 1999 Saab 9-3 SE convertible. Three hours home, and top down all the way.)